There's €6.2 million for teams mentoring young people out of residential care, and seven weeks left to apply
Notice PESSOAS-2026-9 funds mentoring teams for young people under child protection measures, for up to 24 months each, across the Norte, Centro and Alentejo regions. Applications opened on 3 August, with 85% ESF+ co-funding.
Apply / Learn moreThere is a point in the life of a young person in residential care when the system stops walking beside them and they have to do everything alone: rent a room, manage a wage, enrol on a course, book a doctor. This money is aimed squarely at that step.
Notice PESSOAS-2026-9 has opened with more than €6.2 million from the European Social Fund Plus to fund teams that accompany, one by one, young people who are or have been under a child promotion and protection measure. The model is mentoring and proximity, with an individual plan per young person and a ceiling of 24 months of support.
Who can apply
Social solidarity institutions and equivalent bodies that already hold a cooperation agreement or protocol with the Instituto da Segurança Social under Residential Care, Supervised Autonomy or CAFAP. Other organisations already running supervised autonomy services and supporting young people under those measures can also bid.
The Instituto da Segurança Social manages the grants, acting as the programme’s intermediate body.
Dates and numbers
Applications opened on 3 August and close on 2 October 2026, submitted through the Balcão dos Fundos. The notice covers operations in the Norte, Centro and Alentejo regions — Lisbon, the Algarve and the autonomous regions are outside this line. Co-funding runs at 85% from the ESF+, which leaves the applicant to cover the remaining 15%.
The eligible areas are deliberately broad: education and training, getting into work, housing, health, managing money, personal skills and rebuilding social ties, plus diagnosis, technical supervision of the teams and preparing the transition itself.
If you run an organisation and are mapping the funding calendar, this sits alongside other lines still open, such as the €30 million for tourism projects, which runs on considerably longer.
Seven weeks sounds generous. It is not, once you have to assemble a team, a budget and an intervention plan before you can submit anything.
Image: PESSOAS 2030 / Portugal 2030
